Interview on SoundLab

Paul Steenhuissen recently interviewed me for his podcast series SoundLab. The interview was commissioned by Toronto’s New Music Concerts in preparation for the Ukrainian-Canadian Connection concert happening on April 4th, which will feature the premiere of my piece Weeping. Paul asked some very probing and difficult questions, which forced me to define my compositional practice and goals.

We discussed my work with Ukrainian folk music, focusing specifically on Weeping and the grieving songs which inspired and shaped it, as well as an earlier piece Bridal Train, which was commissioned by the Thin Edge New Music Collective. We also talked about my explorations of childhood, Carl Jung’s archetypes and the cello in the piece The Child, Bringer of Light premiered by Paul Dwyer at Carnegie Hall. Finally, we discussed my work with graphic notation and unusual materials in the piece Through Closed Doors, also commissioned by Thin Edge.

In addition to recordings of my music, the podcast includes archival as well as my own recordings of Ukrainian folks music, and a bit of my singing. You can listen to the podcast online or download it here.

The Child (and updates)

I can finally share the recording of The child, bringer of light that Paul Dwyer and I did “in studio” (as in some room at Carroll Studios) while we were in New York. While editing this recording, I had another epiphany about its formal structure and ended up chopping out another section. I think I am fully satisfied with the flow of the piece now, though I added back a tiny phrase that got in the way in the mass chopping prior to the concert. We’ll just have to wait till the next recording to hear that one.

Since finishing the workshop at Carnegie Hall, I have been trying to squeeze out a piece for the workshop at the National Arts Centre. I thought I had a crystal clear image of this piece when I started, but the image has proven very difficult to translate into anything remotely musical.

I’m exhausted from everything I’ve done already and my body’s resistance to this new musical assault is so great I seem to have developed some sort of walking bronchitis. Or maybe it’s TB. That would be very romantic: starving artist wasting away from consumption…in her trendy Halifax condo. Woe is me! Khem, khem…

In better news, I just found out that I received my very first non-academic grant. I am collaborating with Moscow’s Ensemble Sonore and RUSQUARTET to organize a few concerts of contemporary music focused on Canadian and Russian female composers. Should all other funding come through, the “Women of the North” project will take place in Moscow in November 2012. I will be contributing a piece for piano quartet as an homage to Barbara Pentland, one of Canada’s first great female composers.